Wednesday, October 28, 2015

DEAR LOWER-TIER GOP CANDIDATES: WELCOME TO NORMAL LIFE FOR ORDINARY PEOPLE

A number of Republican presidential candidates who aren't in the first tier are upset:
DENVER, Colo. -- Just hours before GOP candidates take the stage here Wednesday night, tensions over the Republican National Committee’s handling of the debates are flaring anew.

At issue this time: greenrooms.

During a tense 30-minute meeting at the Coors Event Center, which was described by three sources present, several lower-polling campaigns lashed out at the RNC. They accused the committee of allotting them less-than-hospitable greenroom spaces while unfairly giving lavish ones to higher-polling candidates, such as Donald Trump and Ben Carson.
'
The drama began Tuesday afternoon as RNC officials led campaigns on a walk-through of the debate site. After touring the stage, candidates got a peek at what their greenrooms looked like.

Trump was granted a spacious room, complete with plush chairs and a flat-screen TV. Marco Rubio got a theater-type room, packed with leather seats for him and his team of aides. Carly Fiorina’s room had a Jacuzzi....

Then there was Chris Christie, whose small space was dominated by a toilet. So was Rand Paul’s....



As a longtime office worker, let me just say to the disappointed candidates: Welcome to my world.

Did any of you ever work at a real job? The first workspace I was assigned to in my current position was literally a repurposed closet; this was, I think, the second time I'd been asked to work in a former storage area. Actually, the previous one, I think, still was a closet when I worked there; fortunately, most of what was stored there wasn't in frequent demand, so interruptions weren't all that common.

Many an office worker is assigned a terrible space intended for other uses, while much more pleasant digs go to higher-ups -- some of whom may have cushy deals that allow them to show up at the office no more than a dozen days a year, leaving the nicest work areas empty much of the year. Oh, and I haven't even started to talk about the horror of "open plan" offices or cubicle farms, which are sold to corporations as a means of encouraging collaboration, but instead lead to staffs of workers using headphones as a way of obtaining a modicum of relief from ambient chatter and foot traffic.

Crappy work areas? Unequal distribution of those work areas? You think it's an outrage. Many of us think it's ordinary life.

2 comments:

Never Ben Better said...

Oh, those poor, poor, put-upon people, their suffering is so

so........

so..............

soooooooooooooooooooooooo hilariously, deliciously wonderful to behold.

*snerk*

Unknown said...

Ha. In my first professional job, I had an entire 1,500 sq ft suite to myself, mostly full of tools and inventory. Just around the corner my dad had a similar but larger set-up, with a convertible sofa, a refrigerator, and a girlfriend. And an utterly ridiculous cat.